Life

Pain is a constant
it lives in my conscious
it lets me know I'm alive
lets me know i can die

trying to run away
from all this stress
im going crazy
as i digress
i recess
back into my mind
i must confess
that i can't find
it
I've lost it
what brings me back
are the things i feel
not just that
but wounds that take time to heal
it brings me back to reality
when i thought i lost my sanity
it brings me back
this beautiful pain
but it isn't beautiful for what you think
that hurt lets me again
something i can't quite explain

I'm a battery
and pain is my juice
I savory the energy
and just let loose
let loose because I have nothing left to lose
but what scares me the most
aren't the nightmares or ghost
but that I'll lose who i am
and never remember again

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Editor’s Note

The number one question our editors receive is—what do the editors and judges look for when judging the contest? The number one answer we give is creativity. Unlike prose, writing composed in everyday language, poetry is considered a creative art and requires a different type of effort and a certain level of depth. Of the thousands of poems entered in each contest, the ones that catch our judges’ eyes are the ones that remove us, even just slightly, from the scope of everyday life by using language that is interesting, specific, vivid, obscure, compelling, figurative, and so on. Oftentimes, poems are pulled aside for a second look based simply on certain words that intrigued the reader. So first and foremost, be sure your poetry is written using creative language. Take general ideas and make them personal. In his infamous book De/Compositions: 101 Good Poems Gone Wrong, W. D. Snodgrass imparts, “We cannot honestly discuss or represent our lives, any more than our poems, without using ideational language.”